Compensation Q&A and Videos

I'm in a dilemma of wanting to change my career from a Data Engineering background to a SWE one.

My dilemma is about me not having too much of a coding background (too much SQL) and not wanting to do badly, alongside with probably having to accept less pay.

When an EM gives you the word that I'm willing to match the offer and the role. What should you ask the EM to make it official?
A revised offer letter or an appraisal letter, or something else?

I'm wondering how companies think about employee compensation for those already in the company. Is it possible to have strong upwards mobility on the compensation side by just staying in your current company and doing great? Or is it better to change jobs?

I know there are a lot going on approaching the end of year in the company/team for everyone, across different levels people are busy with retrospection and planning for next year. For year-end check-in with my manager, I plan to talk about performance as usual, discuss the promotion timeline/expectations, possibly ask about the bonus I should expect to receive? I am hesitating about asking questions on Bonus which should have settled based on my performance in the past year, is it meaningful to mention Bonus in our conversation, or just show your interest in how to perform better rather than how much bonus you are getting this year and how much more you expect to get.

Besides above topics, what else should we cover in Year-End Conversations? Or probably with whom should we have conversations except our managers, so that we can have better understanding on what we did really well or needs improvements on, and lay out action plans for next year? Thank you!

How does it work - Is it just a certain percentage or is there something more ad-hoc that could even be negotiated?

I've noticed that when recruiters reach out on LinkedIn, their main objective is to get me on a phone call to discuss the role they're looking to fill.

From my point of view, there's always 3 things I want to know before speaking with them:

1. The job description (usually provided)
2. The remote work/in-office policy (usually provided)
3. The compensation (usually not provided).

I just had a recruiter reach out looking to get me on a call, and in asking for the above 3, he provided the first 2 and not the comp. range. I messaged him back asking point-blank about comp.

My question is, should I be this direct? Or are there advantages to getting on the phone call with the recruiter first (advantages to me, that is, not to them).

Thanks!

It's performance review time, and I want a nice raise and bonus just as much as anyone else.

Standard procedure for getting a raise seems to be making the case for yourself: keep track of all your accomplishments during the year so you can present them to your boss when asking for a raise/bonus. Simple enough. I'm prepping that list of things right now.

It's also been the case that this past year I turned down 3 offers that each would have paid me more than my current gig - between 20% and 40%. Now, even though I'm underpaid at my current gig, it's also the case that I'm compensated for that by it being super chill - no deadlines, lots of latitude on what to work on, a nice WFH arrangement (1 day in office a week), and pleasant coworkers.

My question is, do I mention that I got the offers in addition to mentioning the things I'd accomplished over the year? There's an element of "hardball" in that, but maybe it's not a bad move. I guess the phrasing of it is the key. So instead of saying "I've got other offers, give me more money or I leave", it's "I really like working here and with you. So much so that I turned down other companies that were offering decently more. Can you see what can be done to raise my compensation?"

Finally, I'm aware that the best way to ask for a raise is :
"I really enjoy working on this team. I want to do more to increase my impact and empower my teammates - What are the steps I need to take to get to that next level?"

After finishing my Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science and and working as a Machine Learning Engineer for ~5 years I'm looking for something new. So far, I've been mostly focused on building software for real time systems, deployments, basic modelling, information retrieval (search) and troubleshooting "legacy" code and systems.

I'm now preparing for a new round of interviewing and I hope to make the jump to a highly paid job, possibly in the US (I'm based in Europe).

After assessing my skills and profile, I noticed that my data engineering skills are really superficial and I'm absolutely not confident in this area. E.g. I know basic SQL, but haven't build a data pipeline or ETL, I don't know hadoop etc.

Now, my question is if it would be wise to do Zach Wilson's  Boot Camp.

What I'd hope to gain from it: data engineering skills, more confidence in this area, and a higher chance of succeeding in (finding) a high paying job.

Do you think it's worth the investment, both in terms of time and money? Or do you think I should direct my focus elsewhere?

This whole train of thought started after a coffee chat with a family friend who is an Engineering Manger at FAANG where she told me that she thought I was getting too comfortable and that I needed to start working on harder problems to keep learning.

In my current role (my first and only job since graduating college in May 2022), I work with prospective F500 Banking & Insurance clients to engineer small scale POCs that prove the value of IBM’s technology, and to hopefully convince them to complete the sale. I was originally hired with the title “Data Scientist” but noticed that my customers were largely uninterested in IBM’s Cloud Platform ML offerings and were already using other hyperscalers. Following the release of ChatGPT, client interest in IBM surged and we have had much more business as clients stand up our Generative AI Studio offering (watsonx) vs others (think Vertex AI, Azure ML, Sagemaker). In January 2024, the business updated my title to AI Engineer to reflect this change, and I work almost completely on LLM related deals now, and almost never with “classical” ML. The primary technologies I am responsible for are: Generative AI Studio, Data Lakehouse (including vector DBs), Data & AI Governance & AI Virtual Assistants (chatbots).

I would say that my role consists of 50% Business Development and collaborating with sales & account teams to develop and progress sales opportunities and 50% hands on the keyboard engineering. None of the POCs we develop are architected with deployment in mind, as IBM also has a consulting business that they promote for that. Ideally the client is billing consulting hours, and my team costs nothing so we should build as fast as possible.

For some context, in college I was largely unsure what I wanted to do afterwards, and joined IBM quite literally because I was a senior who was about to graduate with no job, and I knew someone who worked at IBM sales that offered to help me. That was the first time I ever thought I might go into tech. I went to an Ivy League school where I earned a BA with a joint major in a Social Science + Statistics. The stats I learned were much more applied than theoretical, and despite having the degree, I would say that I lack the necessary mathematical foundation that one would expect of an MLE or Data Scientist, including key topics like Linear Algebra, Stochastic Processes & Discrete Math etc. I did take one intro ML + NLP class, but it was extremely general and not mathematical (although it thankfully helped me fake my knowledge to pass my IBM interview). I also didn’t take any CS courses except one intro Java class.

I know what my classmates at FAANG earn, and their entry level base salaries are at least 50-60k higher than mine. I also do not have any equity in my compensation package, which I know will make the real difference in the long term. IBM is making a concerted effort to reduce our workforce size. Despite being a high performer with consistently good feedback from my manager & colleagues, I don’t think that I will earn that first promotion soon to close that salary gap between IBM & FAANG. Luckily, I don’t see myself getting laid off soon either, so there is no urgency to make decisions.

This company definitely gave me a shot when others probably would not have given my background and Data Science skills at the time. I feel like I have spent the last two years faithfully giving them as much as I can and also learning a lot for myself along the way, but now is the appropriate time to start thinking about where I really want to go in the future.

I feel like the Data Scientist position I was originally hired for required a certain level of mathematical foundation that I had, but that building with pre-trained models definitely does not require. I had skills that were relatively harder to develop and somewhat in value, but now prompt engineering can be taught in almost a day, and one can quickly learn the adjacent tech stack to build and deploy with LLMs without much math. I thus feel anxious about tying my future to this, as my market value would naturally be a function of how hard the skills I have are to acquire. The AI Engineer role requires more of a Software Engineering background to really integrate the LLMs into apps than a math background. I could also keep focusing on learning more math and get into the model training & research side, which is an option I am considering too.

Despite landing here by accident, I learned that I really like big tech, and I think I actually want to end up in a Sales role as well. I am told by my manager that clients give positive feedback about working with me, but I observe that the best sellers who earn the most money in IBM are the ones with deep technical expertise AND who also have the soft skills to become trusted by the clients. These people often worked on product teams or in highly technical roles before finishing in Sales, which is what I think I should do too, as my knowledge base is too broad to really become a technical expert, and the POCs I build are too short to have any knowledge of how to actually deploy these technologies into production.

I would thus like to end up at a FAANG company and make more money, and probably work on an AI product team either as a SWE/Data Scientist or potentially even as an AI researcher (though I’m not interested in a PhD, which I know is important). My question for you all is what would be the best path for me to get there? Should I focus on studying more math and to try for a Data Science/MLE role, or should I try to focus on learning Software Engineering & patching up my math with supplementary self-paced courses.

My initial hunch is go back to school for a 1 year Masters in CS, and take a few math courses beforehand & maybe some more math based deep learning or transformers focused courses while there. This would ideally make me suitable for SWE or DS/MLE/AI Engineer roles, and expand my chances of success. Most American schools require CS bachelor’s degrees and their applications have closed, but this masters program in the UK at Imperial seems open. Does this program look like useful material for someone in my position to learn ()?

I feel like I have half the math and half the programming experience to succeed, but am not knowledgeable enough at either to really do as much damage as I know I am capable of. I would be keen to hear from some of you more experienced veterans out there how you think I should proceed. I have been living at home with my parents and saving money, so I could pay for the masters and assuming I make it into FAANG the extra salary would mean the degree pays for itself in 1.5-2 years. I could go on educational leave and my job at IBM will likely be there for me should I fail to get recruited somewhere else (IBM recently stopped paying for masters degrees unfortunately). I also know that there is opportunity cost of not earning for 10 months while at school.

Given my context and situation, the main questions I want help thinking about are:

• Given the way the industry is moving and my experience, which kinds of roles should I aim for?
• Should I try to earn the masters, or should I try and self-study either math or software engineering while at IBM and recruiting slowly
• If I go the school route, would I have enough time to be able to pass an interview in Fall 2024 when I start (since I would need to recruit right away) if I started preparing now, or should I wait until the next application cycle and start in Spring/Fall 2025.

I know this was long, thank you so much for reading, and thank you in advance for your help. Hindsight is 2020, but I am young and I don’t fault myself for not knowing what I wanted to be when I grew up. I know with hard work and patience that I will get there.

Now that PSC for the first half at Meta is nearing an end, do you think it makes sense to ask my manager for a raise in our next 1:1?

Or, given that Meta is a big tech company, are raises purely based on rating?

I received a written offer from a Series A startup for a FE role over the weekend. I really enjoyed interviewing with some of the team members I met and the Hiring Manager seems to really care about the team and believes in the product. During the initial interview, the HM told me the salary window for the role is 140-195k based on experience and interview performance. After I completed all the interviews, the recruiter told me the team liked me and asked if I would take 140k and stop interviewing elsewhere. The recruiter reminded me that I mentioned months ago that I said 140k was the minimum I would accept for base salary (this is true, I reluctantly gave in and provided a number).

I’m currently working on a take home project for a FE role from a Series D startup that is in an industry I am interested in. I am scheduled to submit it and have the final interview round this week. This company's recruiter said, based on my resume, the anticipated salary range for the role would be 165-175k.

I asked the Series A recruiter to get closer to the potential Series D offer range so we agreed on 155k. Later I received the written offer and the title is for Senior Staff SWE. I was surprised to see that title paired with the 155k base salary (no signing bonus or other cash benefits. Options are on the table but that is just paper money at this stage). For context, in my last role I was a SWE I at a FAANG adjacent company and have 2-3 years of experience (half of that in Big Tech).

I'd like to get advice from the community about how to assess this Series A offer. Startup titles are generally inflated but even so the salary that is presented to me does not align with the title they are giving me. I live in a HCOL area.

If I do get an offer from the Series D company, I've been advised by another more Senior peer with startup experience to take an offer from a Series D company over Series A because the risk of company failure is lower and I will receive more support as a mid-level SWE.

I'd appreciate any insights and questions/topics I should consider to help me assess this situation. Thanks for reading this far :-)

Every year, there's a mandatory compensation one on one with my manager. I find the session mostly informational and it's not really a bargaining / negotiation process. Usually when the compensation conversation happens, the performance review was set in stone a few months ago. There's limited things a manager can do.

What do you ask during the compensation discussion? The nitty-gritty of compensation of my current company is thoroughly discussed over different forums and there's more information over the Internet than what my manager could officially tell me. Should I just quickly close the comp one on one to save time for both of us?

Hey folks,

I'm currently facing a tough decision - whether to ask for a raise at my current company. I am unsure if it's the right time to do so or not. Here's a little context to help you understand my situation

My timeline in the company:

• In 2023
  • I joined the company as a Sr SWE II (L4)
  • I joined the company nine months ago on August 23'
  • I made it to the second review cycle of the year (mid-October), and I got a "Consistently meeting expectations." My manager then said that he was very impressed that I managed to get so much done in that short time and that he could see strong signs of a Staff Engineer (L5) in me.
  • I shipped the most important project in Q4, 2023, on time. I even ended up as the technical lead of that project (the Staff engineer in that project got pip-ed, but that's another story)
• In 2024:
  • I mentored a Sr SWE I (L3) on her first project as a lead.
  • I'm the lead of the web working group
  • I'm interviewing candidates almost on a weekly basis
  • I'm one of the owners of the Design System initiative
  • I just got a "Consistently exceeding expectations" in our current review cycle. I've been praised for how easy it is to work with me, my technical quality, my communication skills, and my thoughtful PR reviews. And that I should keep working on my influence across the organization.

How things are right now:

• My previous manager quit to join another startup, and I got an interim manager (we're hiring another manager for my team)
• I ended up talking about salary adjustments with my previous manager the other day (there, I didn't ask for a raise; it was just a casual conversation). He told me that the company does a compensation review every January and that I wasn't considered for the one that happened in January 2024 because I didn't join earlier than July 2023.
• The next performance review will happen in mid-Oct 2024.
• I will be leading a new tiger team (6 engs) until the end of Q2.

Questions I have right now:

• Is this the right time to ask for a raise?
• I've never asked for a raise.
• I know for a fact that an L3 has a pretty similar (<5%) salary to me, and I know that another L4 has a >5% salary than me.
• Should I wait until I finish this new project, the next performance review, or my first anniversary?
• We're in the hockey stick growth stage.
• I also really like working here, and the market has been bad lately.

Thanks!

If someone was in a company for 5 years out of which some years were in one country while he was laid off in another country, What is the general guideline wrt severance payment?

Is it paid on pro-rated basis or total months would simply be multiplied with the monthly salary of place where they were laid off from?

I know it's best practice not to reveal your target salary or target salary range to recruiters of a specific company and it's definitely bad to reveal your current salary.

But what happens when the recruiter is not for a specific company, but instead a headhunter? It feels weird to withhold my desired salary since they can say to me "buddy, I'm not trying to negotiate against you, I'm trying to help you get what you're looking for." Are they right? Should I reveal that info or is it still better to not tell them?

Additionally, what about revealing to them who I'm currently interviewing with? I did that recently and am a little paranoid that the recruiter might somehow contact the companies I'm interviewing with to harm my chances. I'm pretty sure this is unlikely, but it got me thinking that maybe it wasn't smart to reveal that info.

Recently got promoted from SDE1 to SDE2. I was already in the lower range of the SDE1 salary, and was hoping the promotion will change this. However I only got a 10% raise, putting me on a much lower range in comparison with salaries of other SDE2s in the company. I didn't really get a chance to negotiate promotion here and not sure what would've been the best way to go about it.

Is the best move for me to just switch companies? Should I stay in the role longer so that I can interview for SDE2 positions with more YOE? Is it worth to bring up data about co-worker salaries and trying to negotiate a salary increase using that?

These are questions for Rahul since he put together a great negotiation course that I completed the other day.

I recently skimmed the Design Guru's course on negotiation, and two questions came up

1. How/when do you negotiate? - Live on a phone call/in-person right after the interview, after the interview via email or via phone? What is the most ideal? Design Gurus said email is the best mode.
2. What do you do if they explicitly ask you what your salary # amount is? - They actually asked via email (hiring manager at Meta) before my phone screen what companies I was interviewing at (to name them). Is there a script to be able to not disclose this?

I'm at the 2nd round of interviews with an ~80 person company. I did well in the first interview with the hiring manager, hence my getting to the second interview. This one is with the hiring manager's manager, i.e. my would-be skip.

The Calendar invite for the interview has this description:

In this interview, you will be meeting with Jim our VP.  He will talk to you more about the role and answer any questions you may have.  Please be prepared to discuss your salary expectations with Jim during this interview.

How should I handle this discussion? Is this different from handling a recruiter reaching out for a role where it's imperative not to give the first number?

I'm assuming I should:

1. Not give the first number
2. Try to focus on the value I can bring to the company

Anything else?

Thanks!

Hello! I recently received an offer letter for a senior software engineer role. It seems pretty good. When asked for a range, I gave $215 to 305k. They came back with somewhere around the midpoint. Also, the equity is very generous for a Series A startup... it seems like a good faith offer.

I'm expecting two other offers next week and have a work trial in another interview pipeline for a director-level role. Should I attempt to negotiate a signing bonus to take the offer without waiting for my other options to come through?

Last 2018, I started as a mid level software engineer at my previous company. After one year, I got a chance to lead a team of 6 devs and 3 testers.

So overall, I was leading 9 head counts. The project is a rearchitect and migration to a new implementation that requires a high skill as it requires familiarity of three programming languages, namely, Go Lang, Java and NodeJS. The team members were mostly new to the technology. For my FrontEnd members, they were experienced on ReactJS but the client is using PolymerJS. For my Backend members, they are skilled at Java. None of us knew Go and NodeJS prior to that. However, we are required to learn those because Java and NodeJS are their existing implementation.

Fast forward, the project was stellar and my knowledge went exponentially compared to when I was a mid level. After that, Project Managers love me and I went on full throttle after they give me three projects at the same time. Aside from that I have organizational business contribution:

• Mentored junior, mid-level and senior level
• Taking technical interviews on candidate screening for AWS, Java, Go and NodeJS
• Project estimate for project bidding
• Project Managers asked me to work part time on C# & C++ projects (this one is hell, i cannot explain why)

So the timeline was:

2018 - Mid level

2019 - Senior level

2022 - Tech Lead

2023 - (Present)  Solutions Architect

Given on the scenario above. I would ask the community, how can I gauge my current salary to the market and make sure I am paid well for my skillset? Because I am limited based on the market value in the country I live. And I’m looking at US and AU right now and the market is paying there like crazy. For a solutions architect, it’s like 200K USD (annual) comp for US and 143K AUD (annual) for Australia. Do you think I can find a remote company that pays well based on their market if I stay in my country? Or do you suggest to look for a company that offers a relocation?

I'm a well paid software engineer at a big tech company but I'm based in Canada. The US market is much more lucrative, and my company allows internal transfers to the US and is willing to adjust pay accordingly. However I'm concerned my RSU grant will still be the same, so is my only option to switch companies or perhaps boomerang back in the US? I'm relatively new to the company, so I wouldn't consider moving to the US till I hit the 18 month mark.

Thoughts?

I was under the impression that in the past (before Q3 of 2022), it was often possible to get exceptions to location-based comp ranges and to get an offer that was average for the role even if in a low-COL area working remotely. I've talked to other developers in my area who have said they experienced that.

Has this become more difficult in this market? I was evaluating an offer and the recruiter initially seemed optimistic about exploring going above the location-based pay bands in order to compete with my other offer and current comp, but then I didn't hear from him for two weeks (during Christmas) and then he got back to me saying it was entirely impossible.

As an intern undertaking my first industry-relevant experience, I often find myself drawn to continue working on projects beyond my scheduled work hours. Should this extra time be considered overtime and discussed with my manager, or is it expected to be unpaid and regarded as a personal choice?